The Denton City Council voted unanimously just before 3 a.m. Wednesday to place the fracking ban on the Nov. 4 ballot. The city is aware that if the fracking ban passes the city will be a target for lawsuits from oil and gas companies and mineral owners.

Now, it looks like the state of Texas could go after the city, too.

“While we applaud the city’s efforts to promote the welfare of its citizens, we must make sure it is done in a manner consistent with existing state laws,” Patterson wrote. “The exercise of zoning and the authority of a city to exercise police powers is not a grant of absolute, unfettered power.”

He goes on to say, “A legislative grant of police power to a city is not considered a surrender of the legislature’s right to regulate the state’s own property, which may be located within a city.”

Oil and gas regulations falls under the Texas Railroad Commission and Texas Commission on Environmental Quality.

“In any event, cities are preempted from such regulation,” Patterson said. “The legislature has made the regulation of underground mineral estates and the methods for producing them a matter of state agency regulation.”

Patterson lost his bid for the GOP nomination for Attorney General earlier this year and his term as land commissioner ends in January.

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